Operation Backlog Completion 2025

Celebrating All Things Mysterious – Fonzi Fuddy: Ace Defective

 May Mystery Game Madness, Reviews, Video games  4 Responses »  Tagged with: ,
May 162025
 

Our next mystery game is a short, free PC game called Fonzi Fuddy: Ace Defective.

You play “a,” a detective intern whose first day on the job is marred when she accidentally stabs someone to death. Oops.

Now it’s time to investigate the case alongside your detective partner, Fonzi Fuddy, with the help of the Backwards Corruption Jump device.

This device lets you force a suspect to tell the truth when you find a contradiction. If someone makes a statement that contradicts the evidence, you present the evidence to them. Then you have to fight them in a simple RPG battle. Once you defeat them, time rewinds and they replace their lie with the truth.

On the other hand, if you have evidence that appears to incriminate someone else, you can always make an accusation and get them accused of the crime instead…

There are early endings if you choose to accuse someone, as well as one full ending if you pursue the truth all the way to the end to untangle the full mystery of what happened.

It’s cute and silly, and it’s full of charm. The gameplay is pretty simple, including the combat system, and it takes less than an hour to beat. It looks like it was made for a game jam originally, with a complete version that came out later.

It also ends on a note that suggests there could be a sequel, and I’d love to see a full game in this style. Fonzi Fuddy: Ace Defective is a short game, but it’s worth taking a look at.

Let’s Talk About FuRyu’s Recently-Announced RPG Varlet

 Video games  No Responses »  Tagged with:
Apr 302025
 

Last week, publisher FuRyu announced an upcoming new school life RPG called Varlet.

It’s being developed by Aquria and Team Noir, and it’s due out on August 28 worldwide for Switch, PS5, and PC.

The story follows a new student at Kousei Academy, who learns that the school overlaps with another world and some students have been replaced by monsters. It features both school life systems where you’ll take on requests and spend time with friends, and a combat system where you can use either “leader” style to grant buffs to allies or “ruler” style to crush enemies.

According to the website, there are also six social stats that change based on your choices and open up different options to you.

They recently shared the opening movie, as well.

Varlet sounds pretty interesting and looks like the sort of RPG I’ll want to keep my eye on. I’ve heard mixed things about Team Noir’s previous RPG, Monark, however, so I’ll probably wait to see what Varlet’s reception is like first.

(It’s not as if I’m lacking games in my backlog, after all.)

What do you think of Varlet?

Breath of Fire IV Now Available on GOG

 Video games  2 Responses »  Tagged with: ,
Apr 252025
 

Not too long ago, we were talking about Silent Hill 4 on PC having its missing content restored thanks to the GOG Preservation Program, and now that same program has brought us more exciting news.

GOG has something they call the Dreamlist, where fans can vote for games they’d like to see added.

With over 23,000 votes, Breath of Fire IV was able to get enough attention to be released through GOG.

The Breath of Fire series has been slightly dead for a long time now. Technically the last new game in the series was Breath of Fire 6 in 2016, but that was a mobile game that never got localized and was shut down a year later, after such a terrible reception that its average review score was 1.5 stars. The last proper new entry before that came out in 2002.

So any Breath of Fire news is a positive sign, and I’ve been hopeful ever since Capcom featured Breath of Fire in a poll a couple years back.

Up until today, Breath of Fire IV was most readily accessible through the PSN copy playable on PS3 or Vita, which means the new availability of the PC version is great news. Here’s hoping it sells well and shows Capcom that Breath of Fire is definitely one of those series they should revive!

Are you planning to play Breath of Fire IV?

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